First of all we want to thank all for the many wonderful words on Allen and his work. These condolences have been very precious to us and it has been very encouraging to hear and read how many music and Hi-End HiFi lovers he could and still can inspire with his work.

Many questions have arisen as to the future of Vacuum State, whether we do continue the business after Allen's passing.We know that Allen himself cannot be replaced by any of us, but we do continue.

Thomas Brüntrup as partner since many years and our specialist for all technical questions has acted as a technical translator for many of Allen's ideas and concepts into physical world manifestation. He is intimately familiar with all our products.

Johanna Allgäuer Wright, Allen's wife, has lived and worked with Allen for over 18 years, and is in charge for the administrative side of the business. She is the first person to approach with all questions, requests, etc.

It is our aim to continue or even enhance that Vacuum State products are available on the market and to maintain the high standard of our sonic design.

Allen Wright Passing

With great regret we announce that Allen Wright, founder of Vacuum State and Chief Designer of our products, has died on 23.02.2011.

He devoted a big part of his life to improve the quality of communication, and - loving music - his High End Hi-Fi designs are one outcome of this heartfelt endeavour.

We are thankful for the time he has shared with us, for the love and joy he brought to our lives and for the great inspiration he was and still is. He will fondly stay in our hearts.

Johanna Allgäuer WrightAllen's wife and Managing Director of Vacuum State

Thomas BrüntrupLong-term friend and Technical Specialist in Vacuum State

A Profile on Allen Wright:

Born in New Zealand in 1947, Allen Wright cut his teeth on metal can Mil. Spec. 6L6 tubes, courtesy of his Naval radio operator father and more than once had to be pulled from the internals of communications equipment before lightning struck.

By the age of 12 he was into one tube regenerative radio, and later misspent his high school years building and operating a fully home brewed SSB ham radio station (ZLIBBO) as well as exploding various pyrotechnic devices.

His first stereo system was jury rigged out of the audio stages of 2 old radios, single ended 6V6's with no feedback driving electro-dynamic speakers.

Around this time Allen was introduced first hand to the legendary Tube God when he sampled the 1400 volt anode supply of his transmitter's output stage so that's what happened to Allen's hair - Joe]. Not surprisingly his interests soon widened to include solid state circuits...

All this was in the mid 60's and after discovering that Auckland University could offer no worthwhile electronics education, he went to work in industry.

A spell in a factory testing tube TV sets led to a slightly more familiar occupation servicing 2 way mobile radio systems. Subsequently a move to Australia, a world trip, a wife and two daughters did little for his electronic education, but along the way he gained enough knowledge and chutzpah to talk himself into a job with Hewlett Packard as a service engineer.

This position exposed him to the absolute cream of the then current technology and there gained a strong professional background.

Ironically, his first design to reach production was a solid state (SS) hi-fi AM tuner. Far from being an oxymoron, such a product was essential in Australia in 1974 as there was no FM broadcasting, and the AM classical stations broadcast a low distortion signal out to beyond 15KHz! It all started out as a challenge from a fellow engineer to make an ss device that could better his modified QUAD tube tuner. Not an easy task but once the full weight of HP's test lab was pressed into play, the Wright Audio Developments LDT3A comfortably bettered the QUAD, and sounding like a very good FM tuner in mono went on to become a minor marketing miracle in Hi-Fi Australia.

With this success and following the break-up of his marriage, he left HP and went out on his own as a free lance designer, consultant and all round gun for hire.

Under the band of Haltronics, a period of building low cost digital instruments followed but audio was always the first love. By '76 he had formed the Allen Wright Electronics and was manufacturing some really fringe ss audio equipment designed by local audio guru, Rowan McCombe.

But sales of locally designed and built Hi-End equipment was always difficult in Australia and to pay the rent he started a full scale modification service. Everything from junker's to brand new Mark Levenson's went under the knife in the quest for better sound. This was a wonderful opportunity to be paid to research and although mostly ss gear was involved, much was learnt to be later applied to real audio.

But a second visit from the Tube God was due and while this time was perhaps less painful than the first, it was in no way less disturbing.

A Lux CL35 tube preamp arrived for repair and the owner was talked into having it modified. Similar to the Audio Research SP3A, it was the first current hi-end tube preamp to receive the upgrades developed across years of ss mods. A disturbing allnighter was spent comparing the results of this modification to the very well reviewed Guru designed production ss PreA.

Before the rebuilt CL35 was fully warmed up the ss unit was ahead, then they were level, but by 5AM and after many LPs, it had to be admitted that offerings were due to the God in Glass, for he is the true king!

For a second opinion the Lux was taken to the Guru, who to kept it for several weeks, claiming his doorbell and telephone had failed shortly after it arrived! The owners response to this is not recorded...

Once the true religion was discovered, all ss production was finalised, the company name changed to Vacuum State Electronics and various items of tube equipment soon became available.

In 1980 a major project was started to attempt to break through current performance limits of HiFi electronics. This was successful and resulted in the Vacuum State "Realtime" series of products, custom made for real music lovers, and continuing with only minor conceptual revisions to the present day.

Products were designed under contract for several overseas companies, but by '88 he had expanded his day to day activities to include other business and personal interests, and passed the actual production over to his long time associate, Joe Rasmussen.

Allen Wright now lives in Europe with his German girlfriend and later on wife; where he teaches seminars, produces and films educational videos, develops and hand wires radical prototypes for VSEIII, and drives as fast as possible on the Autobahn.

A Visit at Vacuum State GmbH

There is an article written by Claudio Vito on his first visit at Vacuum State GmbH here in Schaffhausen, Switzerland, in which reports about his first impressions. Currently this report is only available in german language, but you can still get an impression as he has added some pictures he took of the place. Download his article (PDF 600 K)